Entrepreneurial Law Clinic

Tony Siu shares how he built Code and Coffee Philadelphia into a 3,500-member tech meetup technical.ly/workforce/tony…

NVCA and @VCForward need VC volunteers to serve as mentors to the amazing scholarship recipients in Cohort 21 of #VCUniversity: ⏰Time commitment: 1 hour/month (April - June 2026) 🌍Criteria: Active, US-based VC investors (all sectors, but especially life sciences) 🚀Experience: Full-time VCs of all experience levels - OR - retired/part-time VCs w/15+ years experience 👉Sign up today: ventureforward.org/vcu-mentor/

Happy New Year! 🎆 January's Community Dinner is next Tuesday, January 13th! Catch up with staff, community members, and friends while enjoying a delicious dinner. | 3509 Brandywine St. from 6:00-7:30pm. #CommunityDinner #DrexelUniversity #PhillyCommunity

In 20+ years of building @firstround, I’ve never hired for this specific role before. I’m kicking off a search to hire an Investor who will work directly alongside me. They will share my obsession to meet with the highest potential founders as early as possible, often before they even have a clear “imagine if” yet. Although the role itself is still being defined, my commitment is to work closely with this person to help them build the foundation of their investing career. Here’s what’s probably true about you if you’re the right fit: - You’re enthusiastic and obsessive. Following your curiosity has taken you down often weird and winding paths. - You already know a lot of brilliant builders — and more importantly, they enjoy spending time with you. You have a unique ability to generate followership, likely because you give more than you take. - You actually enjoy the work of building relationships from scratch: the cold emails, the endless events, the persistent follow-ups, the months of coffee chats. It requires relentless execution, and that excites you. You go about this work in an authentic way that isn’t conventional “networking.” If you’re looking for a role where the title does all the heavy lifting for you, this isn’t it. - You don’t find it difficult to put unreasonable hours into your work because it doesn’t feel like work to you. You’d call yourself a “work enthusiast.” - You’ve been immersed in the startup world long enough to have real context. What matters most is you’ve been close enough to startups to understand how they actually work and what great looks like. - You obsess over markets, customers, and why some businesses work while others don’t, but you can also hang when a conversation goes deep into technical choices. - You’re an exceptional communicator who tends to be more of a “simplifier” than a “complexifier.” - We’ll work together incredibly closely, but you aren’t someone who needs to be managed. You learn best by watching, by doing, by asking well-calibrated questions — preferring to “take the wheel” instead of being a passenger. You’d rather shape a role than fill one. If you want to spend your time with builders at the very beginning — and learn this craft of early-stage investing alongside someone who’s been at it for two decades and still thinks it’s the best job in the world — I’d love to meet you. SF or NYC only, with long days and lots of travel in both directions. Apply below. jobs.ashbyhq.com/firstround/4f2…

See you Friday?

Tonight! 6 pm!

@TheCloseSchool @PennHealthTech @PennStLawEship @iie_villanova @NovaEngEship @DelXingInvGrp @RobinHoodVent @PennovationWork @JeffInnovation @ICorpsNE_Hub @DE_Innovates @udhorn @PhilaPACT @PhillyVLA @FoundersofPHL @ellenweber @jumpstartangels

Founders: protect your edge! Learn how IP law is changing with generative AI tools, datasets, and outputs in “Intellectual Property in the Age of AI.” Practical, fast, essential! This Thursday, 11/6, at 6 pm. RSVP here: eventbrite.com/e/owning-the-i….

.@DrexelKlineLaw @DrexelLawReview's Annual Symposium is coming up September 25-27. Called “Weaving It All Together: Hair, Health, Law & Policy.” If you attend Friday and Saturday, 14.5 CLE Credits can be had (2.5 ethics). More information and register: drexel.edu/law/news/event…

Stop talking to customers like they’re your investors. @emilykramer has seen too many early-stage startups copy the same lofty language they used in their pitch deck onto the homepage of their website, leaving prospects confused about what they actually do. But you don’t have to throw away your pitch deck entirely. Here’s how to adapt some of the key slides into your website messaging: The problem slide → Your homepage hero. In a pitch deck, you use the problem slide to to convince investors why what you’re building matters and show what you’re building in the medium term. But customers only care about what how you can help address a pain they’re feeling today. The solution slide → Your homepage hero. In the same above-the-fold copy on your homepage, make it super clear what your product does — assume no one has any idea who you are when they land on your site. Vision & why now slide → “About” page. This slide is designed to inspire belief in a big future and show why this moment is the right time to build. In your marketing messaging, this story is an opportunity to tie your product to a broader movement or emerging shift customers want to be part of. But this messaging shouldn’t be front and center on your homepage.

@startupleaders @DrexelClose @DrexelUniv @TempleIEI @vntrlab @rowaninnovation @TempleLaunchPad @PHLInnovation @PHLInnovLab @bftp_sep @PennInnovation @PennovationWork @indyhall @GarryJohnsonIII @Philly_VIP @TU_SBDC @widenersbdc @communityfirstd @UIFworld @Drexel_WIB @TheCloseSchool @PennHealthTech @PennStLawEship @iie_villanova @NovaEngEship @DelXingInvGrp @RobinHoodVent @PennovationWork @JeffInnovation @ICorpsNE_Hub @DE_Innovates @udhorn @PhilaPACT @PhillyVLA @FoundersofPHL @ellenweber @jumpstartangels

@startupleaders @DrexelClose @DrexelUniv @TempleIEI @vntrlab @rowaninnovation @TempleLaunchPad @PHLInnovation @PHLInnovLab @bftp_sep @PennInnovation @PennovationWork @indyhall @GarryJohnsonIII @Philly_VIP @TU_SBDC @widenersbdc @communityfirstd @UIFworld

🚀 Philly founders: The Drexel Entrepreneurial Law Clinic is taking applications for Fall! Free legal help for startups: entity formation, contracts, trademarks & more. Only 6–10 spots available. Apply by Friday, Aug 29: drexel.edu/law/elc/

Are you ready for the primary elections in PA? Visit our #DrexelVotes guide for info on key election deadlines & resources to help you cast your vote: ow.ly/Sz9W50VBGzr

Did SB21's Changes to Delaware Corporate Law Harm Shareholders? clsbluesky.law.columbia.edu/2025/04/16/did…

If you’re a founder who wants to run growth yourself but doesn’t know how — read this playbook. @matthlerner, former PayPal B2B growth lead and co-founder of online growth accelerator SYSTM, has spent years teaching founders a process for uncovering their growth levers. He breaks it down as: 1. Map the customer journey — use data to find the bottlenecks where customers are dropping off. 2. Understand your customer — interview your customers to understand what’s driving (or stalling) action using the Jobs to be Done framework. 3. Run rapid experiments — pinpoint a specific “lever” you want to test, designed to tackle these bottlenecks and optimize growth, and run those tests. Of course, this grossly oversimplifies the work. We get into more detail on The Review (link in the comments).

.@DrexelWestphal prof. Jeff Apruzzese shared his recent research on how opening for a headliner can impact the career trajectory of up-and-coming artists.